"I expect to see a lot more cooperation and collaboration between countries, between producers from different nations at this event," said Paul Lewis, Conference Director of the World Congress of Science and Factual Producers, at the opening ceremony of the 20th Guangzhou International Documentary Film Festival, China (GZDOC) on December 4.

"It means that we get more diverse stories. We get access to more talent," said Lewis, "And there are so many untold stories in China, and so much great talent here."

The GZDOC this year was inaugurated at the Guangzhou Cultural and Art Center and will last until December 7. It features 7,280 documentaries from 156 countries and regions this year, including 3,234 film works from 58 Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) partner countries.

At the opening ceremony, GZDOC officially reached strategic cooperation agreements with the Euro-Mediterranean Documentary Market, Doc Edge, and DOKSERBIA (the Association of Documentary Filmmakers of Serbia), aiming for further cooperation on exploiting Chinese stories.

GZDOC is the only national-level professional documentary festival in China and the largest state-level documentary festival in Asia. This year, over 80 activities will be held during this event, with the involvement of more than 1,000 institutions and over 4,000 professionals.

Furthermore, the Golden Kapok Awards, as one of the highlights of the film festival, will announce its winners at the closing ceremony on December 7. Up to now, 45 excellent Chinese and overseas documentaries have entered the final evaluation.